


How can we not talk about family (when family’s all that we got)

by fanfics_she_wrote



Series: Mara's JatP drabbles & one-shots [5]
Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: 90s, Bobby is a matchmaker, Gen, and 2020, but happy in the end, lets make ourselves sad again
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-15
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:06:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27572794
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fanfics_she_wrote/pseuds/fanfics_she_wrote
Summary: all they had was each other and honestly, that’s all any of them ever neededforjatp week, day five (6 Nov): found family
Relationships: Bobby | Trevor Wilson & Ray Molina & Rose, Bobby | Trevor Wilson & Rose, Ray Molina/Rose
Series: Mara's JatP drabbles & one-shots [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2015428
Comments: 7
Kudos: 40
Collections: JATP Appreciation Week





	How can we not talk about family (when family’s all that we got)

Rose was eighteen years old when she met Sunset Curve. She thought they were incredible. The music they made was magic.

Rose was eighteen when it hit her that life was short, temporary and full of risks – and she owed that realization to Sunset Curve.

She had genuinely liked Bobby back then. They did agree on a date and she was already planning her outfit. But then the rest of his band never showed and the next thing she heard was that they were gone. Just like that.

As she sat with Bobby and did her best to console him, she vowed to never give up what she loved. Music was her life, as it was theirs, and if she would continue playing for anyone, it would be for the boys whose music sounded like magic.

It never did work out with Bobby. They just couldn’t look at each other without remembering Luke, Alex and Reggie. But they stayed friends. She could do that much for him.

Bobby was actually the one who introduced her to Ray.

Rose and Ray took a while to bond. Ray couldn’t quite wrap his head around the fact that Bobby’s closest friends were gone, let alone that a girl they’d met _that night_ couldn’t seem to let them go. He thought it was strange that she was so attached to them. He’d gone to school with them and even he wasn’t so affected. He understood Bobby, but Rose … she was puzzling.

Eventually, when he realised how much music meant to Rose, he understood why remembering Bobby’s friends would be so important to her. The greatest curse to befall any musician was being forgotten.

None of them knew what was happening. One moment, Ray and Rose were helping Bobby hold unofficial concerts, showcasing Sunset Curve’s music, and the next, Hollywood swallowed Bobby up whole.

As Bobby drifted from Rose, Ray floated closer. He didn’t really get music the way she did, but he thought her voice was the prettiest sound in the world. She said she didn’t think she could perform for people, but he always caught her humming to herself, drumming a beat on a table with her fingers, or whispering songs to herself.

Ray wasn’t a musical person and he didn’t quite grasp the impact it could have on someone, but he was starting to. Every moment spent with Rose, watching as her entire demeanor shifted whenever music was involved, helped him understand. Even if he never did fully understand, the sparkle in Rose’s eyes or the bright smile she wore whenever she even talked about music would have reeled him in soon enough.

When Bobby resurfaced as Trevor, Ray barely batted an eyelid when Rose dropped everything for him. He understood Rose. To her, music was everything and what Hollywood had done to Trevor was despicable. He, like Ray and Rose themselves, was still a child. A child who didn’t know any better and now that he did, it was too late.

Trevor talked to them about what to do next. Neither of them knew. What they did know was that Trevor was stuck and he needed friends. So they stood by him, come what may.

And in return, Trevor stuck by them, come what may.

Rose quickly learned that there were things more important than music and it was thanks to Ray that she learned it. She found that listening to Ray enthuse about cameras and photography gave her the same swarm of butterflies that playing a new song did. It took her a while to realise it, but she joined the dots eventually. Ray and music gave her the same fluttery feelings because she loved them both. And one day, she realised the butterflies for music were so much calmer than the butterflies for Ray.

Trevor thought it was hilarious that it took her so long. Trevor thought it was incredibly hilarious that Ray was still oblivious. So, obviously, Trevor set them up on a date.

Ray and Rose were the most awkward couple Trevor had ever witnessed. They were as comfortable as can be talking about what they loved but the moment it was a date, neither knew what to say. So Trevor did what any good friend would do and he dropped everything to help them ease into the idea of dating.

With time, Ray and Rose got closer than anyone had ever been. Ray always carried a camera because he thought Rose, even in her most candid moments, made any scene prettier simply by being part of the photograph. Rose had started writing her own music again, most of it just lyrical love letters to Ray. (Trevor teased them both about it; Ray by recreating every Rose photograph and Rose by horribly performing her songs about Ray for her.)

When Ray proposed to Rose, Trevor nearly physically fought Ray to help him buy the most expensive ring he could. Rose laughed when she found out and had to reassure Trevor that the ring Ray got was more than enough. Trevor sulked about it, but he brightened considerably when he was informed that, as part of his best man duties, they would let him completely plan the entire wedding.

They didn’t tell him it was because neither of them knew a damn thing and both of them just wanted to escape all the drama of planning a wedding.

Nearly a month before they got married, Trevor purchased a new home for himself. Rose teased him about it being a status thing to impress his current girlfriend. Ray teased him about it being a compensation thing.

None of them said aloud that Trevor had been itching to escape his house ever since September 1995. Rose felt that being in the house kept her closer to his past as Bobby and to the boys, but Trevor couldn’t even find it in himself to enter the studio without guilt eating up his insides.

Rose and Ray were stunned to discover that Trevor’s wedding gift to them was the very same house. He might have hated living there, but he knew that Rose wanted nothing more. They promised to look after it and Rose specifically promised to look after the studio.

When Trevor got married, Rose performed in front of a crowd for the first time since she’d met Sunset Curve. Ray told Trevor he would handle photography free of charge but Trevor wasn’t having any of it.

Nine years after they met, their daughters were born more months apart. Little Caroline Wilson and Juliana Molina were inseparable since the moment Carrie laid eyes on Julie. Even in their infancy, they’d already decided to stay by each other. Ray thought it was a hilarious echo of the relationship between Trevor and Rose, especially when, five years later, Trevor’s house was always filled with the sounds of two toddlers hosting concerts, one-year-old Carlos clapping and laughing with no idea what they were doing except that it was entertaining.

They never met up at the Molina’s. Rose and Ray never tried to bring Trevor back to his old house. They never wanted to bring back all that trauma and guilt when he was already looking so much better.

Much older now, Trevor talked about coming clean about his music. He was old enough to understand what that meant and he was old enough to take it in his stride. But Ray wondered what the backlash would do to Carrie. Purely out of fear for her, Trevor kept quiet. But he vowed to never let the same thing happen to her. If she chose to walk into Hollywood, he was going to make sure she did it on her own terms.

Carrie and Julie were eight when Carrie’s mom left. Carrie didn’t quite comprehend what was happening except that Aunt Rose came over more often and sometimes she stayed for dinner that she made and sometimes she tucked Carrie into bed and she always told Carrie that she loved her and Julie got to sleep over now and then.

Rose refused to let Trevor spiral without Carrie’s mom. Most days she was gentle. Some days she was firm. She wouldn’t let Carrie lose another parent and she wasn’t about to lose a brother.

Carrie and Julie got a lot closer after that.

When Rose got sick, Carrie and Julie were old enough to understand what was going on. Julie started visiting Carrie less often. Carrie started visiting Julie. Trevor still couldn’t find it in himself to go back to the house he left. Rose never blamed him. He was only seventeen when he lost his band, his friends, his family. To go back now would open floodgates that Trevor had worked to seal up.

But Trevor didn’t give up on Rose. He brought her the best doctors money could buy and he took care of Julie and Carlos so Ray could be by his wife no matter the time. On the days when Carrie visited them, Trevor would send whatever he thought they might need. He heard Rose’s sister, Victoria, had moved closer to help out too. It made him feel a bit better, knowing Rose had more people in her life that cared than a coward who couldn’t face his past.

When Rose died last year, Ray and Trevor fell apart. Both believed that Rose was all that held them together. Now, all that kept them in minimal contact was the passed greetings via a visiting Carrie.

But eventually, Carrie stopped visiting. Julie withdrew within herself and Carrie struggled to break through for months. It was when Julie fully gave up music, the one thing Rose always told them to cherish, that Carrie snapped. Trusting that Julie would have Flynn, Carrie left. To her, nothing was more important than music. Rose made sure she knew that.

But it’s true that you never turn your back on the family you built for yourself. Rose had built her family up one person at a time and she wasn’t going to let her absence allow it to fall apart. She was going to fight and she was going to make her family fight to stay together.

So one morning, when the fall winds tried to turn him away, Trevor Wilson marched on and rang the doorbell. What was he going to say? He hadn’t planned further than driving to his old house – mostly because he thought he’d chicken out before he got there.

Rose had redecorated beautifully. He barely recognized the front of the house. He had no idea what he was doing.

So when Ray opened the door, the first thing Trevor did was blurt out something that had been sitting on his mind since he saw the video on Carrie’s laptop. “The boys in her band. They’re– they’re…”

“I figured.”

The two of them stood awkwardly for a moment.

“I was just packing lunch leftovers away. I could take some out if you want to sit?”

“I…” Trevor hesitated. He didn’t really want to go inside. He hadn’t been in there since he left the house in Rose’s hands.

“Or,” Ray said slowly, “you could visit Julie in the studio. I think she has some friends lurking around who’d wanna hear the truth.”

“But Carrie is with her now and–”

“And Carrie deserves the truth too. She’s old enough.” Ray held Trevor’s gaze. “Rose would’ve said the same thing. You know that.”

It was the mention of Rose that weakened Trevor’s resolve and he mutely followed Ray down to the studio.

“This is ridiculous!” Carrie cried from inside. “I can’t believe your dad doesn’t know about this. Either you need a shrink or I need a shrink. Whichever it is, I’m telling your dad.”

Flynn and Julie’s protests overlapped while a soft giggle came from Carlos as Ray pushed the door open. “Julie?”

Carrie, in all her concern for Julie’s mental health, bounced right back to where she’d been a little less than a year ago. “Julie’s lost her mind, Uncle Ray! Wait … what are you doing here, dad?”

Trevor, who was looking around at the studio, jumped slightly.

“Yeah,” Luke said, leaning towards Julie, “ask him what he’s doing here, Jules.”

Ray leaned against the door that was still closed. “ _Bobby_ has something to say. To _all of you_.”

While Carrie’s face scrunched up and Flynn slightly frowned in confusion, Carlos waited patiently and the boys fell silent, the gears in Julie’s head slowly ticked until they fell into place. “You already knew…”

Ray folded his arms and glanced at Trevor, nodding his head towards the kids in the garage. In stark contrast to Ray’s casual stance and easy air about him, Trevor had never been more tense in his life – well, aside from the two days where he lost his brothers and then his sister.

And once Bobby started, he couldn’t stop. The words spilled out of him like a broken damn whose water gushed forward with no way of stopping anytime soon. He cried a few times. They cried too.

And as he watched Julie and Carrie crawl up to the seated Bobby and envelope him in a tight hug, Ray thought he could see Rose sitting behind the piano, smiling at them all. And then, Julie said she had something to show – _someone_. With the boys in front of him, Bobby broke down again. Had she not been sitting with the boys to keep them visible, Julie wouldn’t have hesitated to fall into Uncle Bobby’s lap and wipe his tears the way she did when she and Carrie were little.

Ray sat down beside his brother and just like that, Rose’s family was whole again.

They say you can’t choose your family, but Rose had chosen to love these people and even in her absence, she was still what strung them all together and kept them like that. They were her family, and she would make sure they stayed together until she could bring them home, to her. But until then, all they had was each other and honestly, that’s all any of them ever needed.


End file.
